Fink's Estate

Citations

• 77 Pa. Super. 267
• 1921 Pa. Super. LEXIS 249

Syllabus

<p>Decedents’ estates — Executors’ or administrators’ accounts — Surcharge property of decedent — Orphans’ court — Jurisdiction.</p> <p>The orphans’ court has full power to inquire into and determine all questions standing directly in the way of the conversion and distribution of the property of a decedent, if at testator’s death the property is shown to have been in his possession, or if for any other reason it was presumptively his. In such case, the mere denial of his ownership, unsupported, will not oust the court of its jurisdiction, but the court may proceed with the investigation so far as to inform itself whether the denial is made in good faith and a substantial dispute exists.</p> <p>Where, in a hearing before the orphans’ court, abundant evidence was produced to establish that several articles, with the value of which the accountant was surcharged, had been undoubtedly in the personal possession of the decedent, and that although she was a married woman she had been engaged in the management of her affairs, which reasonably accounted for the ownership in her own right of the articles in question, -the jurisdiction of the orphans’ court to dispose of the matter in controversy will be sustained, and a decree surcharging the administrator with the value of the articles erroneously omitted from the account will be affirmed.</p> <p>Since the passage of the Acts of. 1887 and 1893, relating to the rights of a married woman, the possession of personal property by a wife raises the same presumption of ownership by her that would exist in other cases. Notwithstanding the fact that a married woman lives with her husband, she may own and possess property of her own and that possession carries with it every incident that would follow the like possession by any other individual.</p>